Saturday, 27 August 2011

Warning: Wardrobe May Contain Lion And Traces Of Snow

I've just read a book that reminded me of how I used to feel when I was around 11 and YEARNED with all my heart for life to be less real than it is. It was (or, at the time of writing, will be, as not in fact published till September 15th) The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern. I won't do any of that smug "I've got a proof copy" stuff, or indeed add any spoilers, so if I say it's AS GOOD AS "JONATHAN STRANGE AND MR NORRELL" you will know what I mean, and if you don't you probably aren't a huge fan of Wardrobe literature.
Wardrobe literature, since you ask (yeah yeah), is anything that lets you believe that somewhere, if you can only find it, there is a door to somewhere amazing, or a box that contains something amazing, or a tiny odd shop that sells something amazing, etc etc, that proves beyond a shadow of a doubt that the boring old tax-paying workaday hangover road-rage noisy-neighbour Real World is just a waiting room for somewhere much better, where anything is possible. Wardrobe literature introduces the real world and then dismisses it. It doesn't bamboozle you by throwing you headfirst into Middle Earth or Earthsea, like a travel brochure for somewhere exotic you will never visit and don't speak the language anyway. Devotees of wardrobe literature get excited by antique shops and libraries. They feel a prickling of the hairs on the back of their necks when they see, you've guessed it, a large old wardrobe, or a hidden door, or dusty attic steps. They stop telling people how excited these things make them because they worry that it sounds a bit childish, but the feeling never goes. The phrase "based on a true story" makes them sigh heavily and switch off.
I have attached a very sketchy reading list below. If I have glaringly omitted anything, please let me know...

I tried to read The Dark is Rising series, I loved the first book but when I was on the second I got so truly frightened that had to stop.

There was a timeshift book - "A Stitch in Time" or maybe "A Wrinkle in Time" - can't remember exactly which.

Of course, "The Owl Service" is my all time fave - do you count that? It may not be "wardrobe" but it's certainly "attic". Any scratchy noises coming from above at night certainly have me thinking of plates and flowers.

Oh my goodness....only today I wondered if you were ever going to post again and then you do.......anyhoo..........I've never heard of wardrobe books, but I do remember buying The owl service for my son many years ago........and you are so right about those awful 'please mommy don't...' books.......

MM - they can be re-read, you know. I have them all! And I did include Owl Service, but I added it after you got the feed. Attics definitely included!

Libby - Known in the trade as Misery Memoirs. Nobody likes them except W H Smiths. We occasionally have competitions to invent the best title, but sadly "Sold for a packet of Lambert & Butlers" actually exists, or similar...

Of your 'Books for Adults' list, I have only read 'Jonathan Strange', which I loved. That scene at the beginning in York Minster where the gargoyles talk to each other had me hooked immediately.

I read most of those on your 'Children's' list when a child, and I will still read Diana Wynne Jones and Susan Cooper when the fancy takes.

How are you with 'Victorian Pastiche', which for me, has similarities to Wardrobe fiction if written well? Fingersmith, The Quincunx, The Unburied, and The Crimson and the White are all excellent examples.

Ben, you should read "The Twelfth Enchantment" by David Liss - NOT ONLY the full Wardrobe, BUT ALSO (like Strange&Norrell) pastiche Austeniana. Yes I also love the whole Victoriany thing, especially Crimson Petal. Have you read "Kept" by D J Taylor? Great (if non-magic).

Anonymous - Sorry sorry - of course all of E Nesbit counts, apart from the unmagical but otherwise splendid Railway Children. Wasn't one of her short stories set in Brixton? I lived there and never a psammead did I see either.

I am a huge fan of Wardrobe literature...will be calling it that from here on in. Two suggestions. Neil Gaiman's Neverwhere. It actually made the Tube feel magical. And also John Connelly's The Book of Lost Things.

I spent YEARS as a child (um...well into my mid-adolescence) poking around in the back of my closet (being American, we didn't have wardrobes) looking for that wonderful secret passageway thanks to C.S. Lewis. Somewhere in young adulthood the voraciousness I had for reading disappeared (my "quiet" time was spent sleeping off the previous dusk to dawn partying or in doing artwork). Now quite a bit older and a lot more careful about burning my candle, I am avidly embracing your reading lists. Plan to start with Jonathan Strange.

What a great post! You had me at 'Wardrobe lit', but then to top your children's list with The Dark is Rising? Well, I'm yours forever. It's my all-time favourite book from childhood.In fact, thinking about it now, I might have to blow the dust off it and rediscover...

I've just discovered your blog and wanted to say how much I love your idea of 'wardrobe lit'! It's such a great phrase and really sums up what such books do. I've read most of those on the children's list, and am looking forward to discovering those on the adult list too. I needed some inspiration for new books, so this is perfect.

I hope you don't mind, but I've recommended your blog for an award. If you would like to take it up, please just see my blog for details.

Today (13th May 2016) I am mostly:

wondering if I can get to Tesco's and back for a sandwich without missing the afternoon book delivery (what are the odds)

reading "Archie" (the reboot of the 60s comic) by Mark Waid (Daredevil) and Fiona Staples (Saga). I was never, I should add in self-defence, an Archie fan, but the idea of it being all Sunnydaled up is intriguing. If you're a nerd.

wearing "Lys Mediterranee" by Frederic Malle. It's like I've beaten you to death with a bunch of lilies, and you liked it.

unable to stop singing "Cielito Lindo" (aka "the AI YI YI YIII song"), thanks to a violin-playing busker who has been playing variants of it outside for the last 4 hours.

About Me

A veritable dustbin of sparkly factoids. Don't let the fact that I smoke Gauloises put you off. It's a habit, not an indication of moral turpitude. I like anything in a martini glass too.
I used to say I hated politics, sport and reality TV. Then the Olympics happened. Now I just hate politics and reality TV.
My favourite quote is "Why must you tell me all your secrets when it's hard enough to love you knowing nothing?" (Lloyd Cole, for you Google searchers). Optimist by nature, pessimist by experience. Oh, and I'm a ginger.

Strange and oddly unrelated Google searches by which people have found my blog...

"pork pie sexual encounters"

"its hard to say words that is not final because many things happen in between"

"Fodens reliable ant"

"my wife say to ex i love you and to me say i love you"

"Frankie Boyle 2p sausage"

"crayon book pictures channelled whelk"

and a special apology to anyone who came here following the promise "Lucy has one of the hottest racks on the planet", IT'S NOT ME. THAT'S A WHOLE OTHER WEBSITE. Although my rack is epic in its own smalltown way.

Perfumes I may bankrupt myself buying one day.

He's one of us!!

Now I love him even more. If it turns out he also likes calvados, Nabokov and the TV works of Aaron Sorkin (what are the odds?) I will in fact lay down my life for him.

Role models I channel when necessary

Miss Prothero in "A Child's Christmas In Wales" by Dylan Thomas : "She looked at the three tall firemen in their shining helmets, standing among the smoke and cinders and dissolving snowballs, and she said, "Would you like anything to read?" "

My mother the librarian, who can express displeasure with a very slight widening of the eyes. Invaluable for dealing with the general public.

My late paternal grandmother, a woman who consumed nothing but untipped Senior Service and gin 'n' sherry (aka "alkie's delight") and once drove down a 1:3 hairpin bend in her Reliant Robin with both hands in the air cackling "Of course, I'm COMPLETELY pissed".

Eleanor of Aquitaine - brought literature and table manners to Britain. And a fellow ginger.

Miss Jones from "Rising Damp". ...."Oh, Mr Rigsby, the music's gone to my head like wine!!!"

Lady Colin Campbell

Gertrude Elizabeth Blood, 1857 - 1911. I go and say hello to Gertie Lady C every time I'm near the National Portrait Gallery. The perspective is all wrong, but she's just daring you to have a go. A raised eyebrow says more than a thousand sarcastic put-downs.

Sei Shonagon (c.966 - 1017)

...also a big fan of pointless lists of things, although I have never reached the giddy heights of "Things that look a bit pathetic".

Esteemed Colleagues

Booksellers Anonymous

"Well, to be honest, after years of smoking and drinking, you do sometimes look at yourself and think...You know, just sometimes, in between the first cigarette with coffee in the morning to that four hundredth glass of cornershop piss at 3am, you do sometimes look at yourself and think...this is fantastic. I'm in heaven." - Bernard from Black Books

Fictional men I have had a crush on (in chronological order)

Asterix. I wrote a proposal of marriage, to me, from him, in yellow crayon and presented it to my mother. I was 4 at the time.

Snufkin.

Prince Gwydion of the Sons of Don.

Ged, aka Sparrowhawk, the Wizard of Earthsea (well, one of them).

Tintin. What can I say? I was 6.

Mr Knightley from "Emma". So much more appealing than the rebarbative and snotty Mr Darcy. Always marry your best friend.

Brat Farrar.

Steve Carella of the 87th Precinct.

Tom Ripley, eponymous hero of the Patricia Highsmith series. Not sure if I love him or secretly want to be him (how liberating would it be to just murder some complete stranger on a train because their clothes annoy you a bit?) Envy his cute french wife though.

Amit Chatterji. Honestly, how was he not the most suitable boy?????????

John Constantine, the old Hellblazer himself. Well, it'd be rude not to. He's hot! He's scruffy! He's British! He's a warlock! And he smokes! Although the fact that he seems only to smoke Silk Cut makes him oddly wussy.

Charlie Parker - not the jazz musician, the private eye from "Every Dead Thing" et al. Traumatised. Psychic. Mind you the fact that I have a crush on John Connolly, the author, may have a bearing on this.

Berry Rydell from "Virtual Light". Endearingly shambolic.

King Mob from "The Invisibles". Buff, bald, a trained assassin, and an inveterate quoter of The Kinks.

Dexter Morgan, unapologetic (nay, gleeful) serial killer from "Darkly Dreaming Dexter". The TV series got him wrong, even if it was great viewing. Should have been Brendan Fraser.

"Angel" by Thierry Mugler. Vile. Smells of the cat-hair-covered toffee you find down the back of the sofa. Also of ageing and desperate cabin crew.

The "Toast" catalogue. Smells of linseed oil and old haddock. WHY??? What are they printing it on? Or with???

Wet Barbour jackets, and don't kid yourself otherwise, Tarquin.

Things people do that make me want to slap them.

Shout "I can't believe you're doing this to me" at a traffic warden who is, usually deservedly, giving them a ticket. Believe it, love, the evidence is right before you.

Preface a question with "Question!"

Get grumpy about "too much choice" in bookshops etc. What the hell does "too much choice" mean??? I've started saying cheerfully "Absolutely! Bring in a totalitarian Communist state and you'll just have one book which you'll HAVE to read!"

Sulk. Irritating in a small child, positively BACKWARD in anyone over 15.

Use phrases like "it's not in my skill set" when they mean "I'm too idle/self-important to learn". Lucinda Ledgerwood, come on dowwwwwn!!